The Attack that Wasn’t

A young McCain campaign worker was recently the center of a rather odd incident. The gist of the story is that she told the police she had been attacked by a black man because of her McCain sticker. According to her initial story, the man “wrote” a backwards B on her face using a dull knife. As it turns out, she later admitted that nothing of the sort happened-she saw that she had the B on her face and simply made up the story. Not surprisingly, the police have recently said that she has a history of mental problems.

The evidence seems to be that this was not a calculated attack against Obama’s campaign. Instead, it seems to be an unfortunate incident involving someone who clearly seems to be in need of help. Naturally, some people will make note of the fact that the imaginary attacker was said to be a black man and interpret this as involving racism. Some might also suspect that this was not just an unfortunate incident, but that the woman intended to launch an attack on Obama that would stir up the old fears of black men attacking white women.

Interestingly, I do suspect that some people will believe that the attack was real, much as some folks still think that Obama is a Muslim or an Arab. I’m reasonably confident that emails and rumors are already going around that Obama’s supporters (especially black men) are targeting McCain supporters (especially young white women) for violence. I’m confident that McCain does not support such tactics. He certainly seemed genuinely disgusted with and tired of the unfounded attacks on Obama. Of course, the negative tactics that his campaign have adopted certainly have not helped matters.

Fortunately, while we Americans often disagree in very heated ways when it comes to politics, we generally do not enage in politically inspired violence against one another. Not to say that it never happens, of course.